Smart Shox Reflash

An Industry first,  the ability to flash and dramatically improve the damping characteristics of your BRP Skidoo Snowmobile with Smart Shox. We rode and tested these machines for two seasons, recording our impressions and complaints and listening to our customers comments and issues as well. Now, with our Partner Accelerated Technologies, we have the ability to get a corrective flash to your KYB Suspension module.

COMFORT MODE: Up front, the ski shocks we found to be very, very loose and sloppy in Comfort Mode. Skidoo went extreme in comfort mode and have almost zero compression resistance in the shocks when in this mode. You can see, on the graph attached, that it is a flat line at basically zero damping support. We found this to be so weak, some of our tester riders felt motion sickness lol. The shocks bottomed easily on the slightest bumps at even a medium pace. There was also no increase in damping as the shock speed accelerated which is not normal shock behavior and it exaggerated the loose feel in the front end. We also found the rebound to be a tiny bit slow as the shock tried to recover from the high speed hits, which could pack the front end down. This combined with the super weak compression resulted in a front end that ran low in the travel and bottomed often.

REAR SHOCK: The rear shock, quite uncreatively from the factory has just been set with it's compression at a flat line zero damping. The sensation this gave us on the big bumps was the suspension was SO SOFT it blew through the top 60% of the travel almost instantly, and then stopped, which then drove the rider deep into the seat and then jettisoned them out of the seat. This sensation is exacerbated by overly light torsion springs (really bad on the Mach). This gave the sled a super comfy, but bouncy sensation, which we found quickly led to some control loss as the sled exceeded typical terrain above 25-30 mph. It seemed Skidoo went to a maximum for effect in Comfort Mode, but we found it inadequate and unbalanced at even modest trail speeds. We gained both dramatic control AND improved comfort by firming the high speed compression a bit and the low speed compression more to keep the riders weight constant as it loaded into the seat through the suspension travel if that makes sense. We also ended up at a much more blended rebound curve in the rear shock to hold it's recovery better on the big hits when the shock does go deep, This eliminated the tendency of the sled to feel like it was going to eject the rider out of the seat on a big bump.

SPORT MODE: For the skis, we kept the same theory as with comfort, yet we increased the compression damping about 30% to match the riders pace that we envision occurs when we flip that switch from COMFORT to SPORT. Skidoo, as you can see by the graph, made ZERO change to your ski shocks in the compression direction and only a slight change to rebound when you flip between COMFORT and SPORT. We loved the 30% increase with our flash as you immediately feel the front end plant in the corners and the desire to inside ski lift reduced immediately.

REAR SHOCK: For the rear, Skidoo followed the trend of the ski shocks and made almost no change to the compression damping of the rear shock and very slightly increased the rebound damping. As for our correction, we increased the compression damping about 20% over comfort mode and firmed the high speed rebound moderately to match the increase in rider speed to keep the sled balanced. We spent quite a bit of time working on SPORT MODE, as we expect it to be the mode used most often by most riders. We really worked on trimming the compression and rebound damping front to rear to keep the sled flat through the bumps and corners. The 137 chassis responded dramatically to adjustments in damping and would either ride high or low in the front or rear if we were off by much more than 3-4% in our numbers. It was really cool to feel how well the Smart Shox system worked and responded after we got the damping numbers really close.

SPORT PLUS: Up front, Skidoo really went to the moon here and increased the compression damping by 70%!!! over Sport Mode!!! Our high speed damping almost matches this amount, but we creep up on it progressively as the shock speeds up with a milder low speed compression setting. This will give the rider much better grip and more importantly comfort over the small bumps in SPORT PLUS, yet respond the same on the big hits. We also have a much more compliant rebound setting in SPORT PLUS that works much better in the high frequency chop, allowing the sled to recover quickly through the bumps at high trail speeds.

REAR SHOCK: Here, Skidoo has an ok compression setting, but they went way overboard with the rebound, which ties the sled down through the bumps. It takes one big hit well, but on a beat up Sunday trail, it leaves the snow flap dragging as the shock can't recover when the bump frequency is high. Our flash has a nice blended rebound curve that matches the R Motion X's progressive skid quite evenly and then has a robust compression curve that will give you good support when riding at 90-100%. All of our curves also transition much smoother from compression to rebound, where the Skidoo curve is very digital going from comp to reb very abruptly. We call this, the crucial shocks 'turn around' zone and it is really important to feel connected through the bumps.

*This flash requires you to bring us the snowmobile or you can send us the KYB shock module and we can bench flash. We will need the make, model, and VIN to complete the bench flash.